New Scientist

New Scientist covers the latest developments in science and technology that will impact your world. New Scientist employs and commissions the best writers in their fields from all over the world. Our editorial team provide cutting-edge news, award-winning features and reports, written in concise and clear language that puts discoveries and advances in the context of everyday life today and in the future.

Shaking the family tree • The idea that Denisovans were their own species means a rethink of our origins

New Scientist

The ancient city under the sea

An unlikely boost for nuclear fusion • By revising the discredited idea of “cold fusion” from the 1980s, a new experiment may aid efforts to achieve practical fusion power, finds Alex Wilkins

Lacing food with fat-trapping microbeads could help us lose weight

Lighter-coloured cars could mean cooler city streets

The brain doesn’t actually reorganise itself after a limb amputation

Ceres may once have had the conditions to sustain life

How to tackle environmental issues when the world can’t agree • The requirement for unanimity hampers talks on plastic pollution and climate change – there are better ways to make progress, says Madeleine Cuff

Lesser-known food allergens pose a big risk

First steps towards a secure quantum internet

Is Planet Y hiding past Neptune? • An Earth-sized object, distinct from the hypothesised Planet Nine, might lurk in the outer solar system

Super-cool cement could stop buildings trapping heat inside

Earth’s carbon sinks are waning due to climate feedback loops

Uranus’s newest moon could be the first of many more

A bespoke treatment for depression • An implanted device, likened to a pacemaker, selectively targets different areas of the brain

Flower-like origami patterns unfold in one smooth motion

A new way to measure electricity • What previously required two separate quantum devices could now be done with one

Artificial superfood for bees boosts colony reproduction

Arctic heat causes huge Svalbard ice loss

Covid-19 may make women’s arteries stiffer

Rare weather pattern may explain why 2023 was so hot

Radio-wave treatment passes the smell test

AI model can predict solar flares • Knowing the sun’s future appearance may alert us to impending space storms

The tiny secrets behind chocolate’s finest flavours

Faking it • Why do we love fake lips, but hate fake meat? This inconsistent attitude has implications for sustainability, says Sophie Attwood

Future Chronicles • Seeing further By the 2070s, advances meant an optical telescope with an effective mirror size of 3000 km could be built on the moon. Rowan Hooper investigates

Up in the air

The ultimate takeover • Why did Christianity grow from an eastern Mediterranean sect to a religion followed by billions? Michael Marshall explores Alice Roberts’s latest book

Compounding factors • The history of carbon dioxide’s role in life on Earth combined with a call to climate action makes for compelling reading, finds Chris Stokel-Walker

New Scientist recommends

Love letters from Earth • Clues to our planet’s dramatic past are in the layers of rocks we might overlook. A great guide shows why they deserve our attention, says James Dinneen

Your letters

Welcome to the family • Could Denisovans, rather than Neanderthals, be our closest ancient relatives? Colin Barras looks at what this would mean for our family tree

Shaking the tree

Talk to me! • With the help of artificial intelligence, we are edging closer to deciphering animals’ speech. But who will we speak to first, asks Chris Simms

Rehabilitating cancer • Instead...